


Please Forget to Fall Down

by Woodswolf



Series: never meant to be [1]
Category: Lego Ninjago
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Incomplete, Light Angst, idk what else to tag this as tbh, lloyd suffers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-02-12
Packaged: 2018-05-19 20:33:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5980246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woodswolf/pseuds/Woodswolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An incomplete fic focusing around Lloyd and the concept of choices: choices which were taken, choices which were made, and choices which did not exist at all.</p><p>This was originally a oneshot that was meant to be for the "Ninja Never Quit" Ninjago fanzine, but I never finished in time for the deadline.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Please Forget to Fall Down

**Author's Note:**

> The title was originally taken from the song "Northern Downpour" by Panic! At The Disco. You can listen to the song [here.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zouSojyIi94)

The first time, it was a question of “why” instead of “why not”.

Why should he _want_ to be the Green Ninja?

Sure, it would be cool. Kai and the others had practically been drooling every time the title was mentioned in any conversation. There was all sorts of crazy stuff that prophecies said the Green Ninja would be able to do, but…

Garmadon was his _dad…_

He didn’t want to _hurt_ him…

Lloyd didn’t want to hurt _anybody…_

But it wasn’t like he could refuse it. It was destiny. There was no real “choice”, you’d end up doing something eventually.

And besides, he looked up to them. They were his _friends_. He wanted to have elemental powers, too, just like they did.

He took the title not because he wanted it, but because someone needed to have it.

_(Well, he supposes, he did want it just a little bit.)_

* * *

It wasn’t until the incident with Tomorrow’s Tea that he started to wonder if he made the right choice.

It was… unexpected. It came out of nowhere. It was strange and cruel and didn’t make any sense. Then again, had anything _ever_ made sense in his life?

Not really.

And it wasn’t like it could really change anything. He may have looked older, but he was still one of the group, one of the Ninja. Lloyd was their friend, and that would never change.

_(Looking back on it, though, he knows that he was only half-right.)_

* * *

It didn’t really hit him until it looked like they’d lost.

The Overlord had escaped to the other side of the world. The Bounty was in pieces, shards of it strewn along the beach like playing cards. Nobody knew they were there. They had nowhere to go, no plan, and no options.

They were finished.

And still, some part of Lloyd wanted to slap everyone standing there.

They couldn’t just _give up._ They didn’t have the _option_ to give up. That was what they’d told Lloyd, over and over they’d pounded it into his head, but what were they doing?

_What were they doing?_

The words didn’t really come out like that, because if he knew one thing about the team, it was that “pull yourselves together” never worked. The little speech still had the essence of it, but a different flavor, something sweet to take off the edge.

And it worked. They found a way. They made it off the island.

It was the first time that he’d had to work alone.

_(He knows now that it wasn’t the last.)_

* * *

There was something terrifying about ascending the tower that was simply beyond words.

His friends fell away one by one. Lloyd wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Something seemed wrong about it, he thought.

Something seemed wrong about the way that they kept telling him to go on without them.

Something seemed wrong about the way that he couldn’t argue with them.

Something seemed wrong about the way that he was left alone, forced to hop all the way up the stairs, because his leg was broken, which was great.

But it wasn’t _their_ fault…

No, Lloyd decided, it wasn’t their fault. It was _his_ fight. It had always been his fight.

_(He had known even then that he was lying, but it didn’t make much of a difference now.)_

* * *

It felt _wrong_ to flee.

Who cared about his powers anyway? Why did it matter? Every fight always came down to “his-powers-this” or “his-powers-that” and he was sick of it.

Nobody would let him fight with his brothers, but Lloyd couldn’t fight alone. He and his dad already been cornered in the jungle once, and now they were fleeing for their lives.

Why was it that he always ended up with the hard choices…?

His mind went back to those first few times, when everything came down to a simple yes-or-no answer. Did Lloyd want to be a Ninja? Yes. Did he want to fight with his brothers? Yes.

Did Lloyd want to be the prophesized Green Ninja? Well… not really, but he didn’t have a choice in _that_. It was a prophecy.

Did he want to have to fight his father? Even though it had ended happily… no, he hadn’t.

Maybe he wasn’t meant to have the easy choices.

Maybe he wasn’t meant to have choices at all.

_(Thinking back on it, he realizes that this was when his world-view started to collapse.)_

* * *

Lloyd was helpless.

Again.

He had been captured by the Overlord, and was currently locked in a magical cage somewhere inside the Mechdragon, which was flying who-knew-where. His powers were being drained, and the Overlord was preparing to use them for some kind of nefarious purpose.

Lloyd didn’t know where his friends were, or what they were doing. Somehow, though, he doubted that they’d save him in time.

And it hurt to move, and it hurt to think. The only thing he could see in his mind’s eye was a slow, repetitive loop of his father falling, over the cliff-side, first one foot and then the other, and then nothing more than a feather floating down to the water below.

Lloyd didn’t even get to see the splash.

He wanted to scream.

_(Of course, the worst was yet to come.)_

* * *

He felt out of place.

He hadn’t known Zane for nearly as long as the others had. They’d been living and working and training together for close to a year before Lloyd had even _met_ them, and it was even longer before Lloyd joined the team for real.

But Zane was still his friend, and Kai and Jay and Cole and Nya were still his friends. And then there was his dad, and his uncle. So it hurt – it definitely hurt, because Zane was dead and nobody knew how to take that.

But Zane wouldn’t have wanted to see them like this.

He wouldn’t have wanted them to be like this.

So Lloyd took it upon himself to make sure that everyone was okay.

_(Even now, he knows that he shouldn’t have done that.)_

* * *

He brought the team back together: not because he wanted to, but because he needed to.

 

 

_[section is incomplete]_

* * *

He woke up from a nightmare and decided that it was the last straw.

He couldn’t take it anymore. He didn’t want to take it anymore. He didn’t want to deal with it anymore.

Lloyd had had enough of watching himself drown, of feeling his eyes drift shut under their own weight while the current pushed him along over the edge of the abyss.

Lloyd had had enough of being the only one who cared.

He packed a bag. Looked around to see if anyone was still awake. Everybody was sleeping, slowly and peacefully, and Lloyd couldn’t handle it.

He left a note on the table in the main room.

_I need to go. Don’t look for me. Goodbye._

He walked out the door under the moonlight, and he didn’t look back.

_(To this day, he believes that it’s the only choice he ever truly made.)_

* * *

Five years later, he’s standing on his apartment’s balcony, looking out beyond the city at the distant sea.

His dye job’s fading again. He’s going to have to do it again soon.

 

 

_[section is incomplete]_

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to read about how this fic was meant to end, I actually explained a lot of it [here.](http://woodswolf-writes.tumblr.com/post/129805552790)
> 
> It... may or may not be a contributing factor to why I never finished this in the first place, but who knows, honestly.


End file.
